Freddie Mercury and Montserrat Caballé’s ‘Barcelona’ To Be Re-released

Island Records have announced they will be releasing a special 25th Anniversary edition of Freddie Mercury and Montserrat Caballé’s classic ‘Barcelona’ album.

The special anniversary version of the album ‘Barcelona – The Special Edition’ will be released on what would have been the singer’s 66th birthday.

The original Barcelona album, named after the Spanish city that hosted the Olympics in 1992 and for which Mercury had been asked to write the theme song, was to become the final solo work Mercury would complete.

The title was also a tribute to the home city of his beloved recording partner Montserrat Caballé, with whom Freddie was captivated and had planned to perform the title song with at the opening of the 1992 Olympics opening ceremony. Sadly Mercury passed away eight months before this could happen.

One of the most audacious, and groundbreaking musical collaborations of the 80’s, ‘Barcelona’ was for Freddie the embodiment of his long held fantasy of combining rock and opera and realizing his dream of collaborating with the woman of whom he said after first seeing her performing at London’s Royal Opera House in 1981: “I have now heard the best voice in the world.”

The ‘Barcelona’ Special Edition album will be at the centre of a new groundswell of interest in the work of the late singer, who died in November 1991 and in whose memory his birthday is now marked each year with the HIV AIDS fundraising day, ‘Freddie For A Day’.

Arriving at the same time will be a major new documentary ‘The Great Pretender’, released on 24 September, and a freshly authored and illustrated book, ‘Freddie Mercury: The Great Pretender – A Life in Pictures’ which is released on 5 September (Goodman, £25).

The album will be available in CD & Deluxe CD and Digital formats to include bonus audio and DVD extras.

Click to buy ‘Barcelona – The Special Edition’ – standard, vinyl and deluxe.